U.S. Mid-Am winner starts GoFundMe page to pay Masters expenses
Sammy Schmitz won the U.S. Mid-Amateur title earlier in October, thanks in large part to a final-match par-4 ace. With the trophy, he also earned an invitation to the Masters in April.
That’s good and bad. It’s good for an obvious reason: It’s the Masters, duh.
But it’s bad because the 35-year-old father of two lives in River Falls, Wis., where there isn’t much of a winter golf season. Schmitz also has a dayjob, working for a health-care services company. However, over the next six-plus months, Schmitz is going to need to find time and a place to play so he can keep his game in good shape for his week at Augusta National. He’s also going to need to take several trips to home of the Masters, where he’s entitled to practice rounds as a tournament invitee. That costs a lot of money — so much so that Schmitz’s wife, Natalie, launched a GoFundMe page to help raise funds in support of her husband’s dream opportunity.
“Being a father of two beautiful girls and having bills and daily expenses has made it very difficult to find the income to make his dream of playing in the Masters come true,” she wrote on the page, which launched Sunday.
“We currently live in a small town in Wisconsin where the winters are filled with snow and sub below (sic) temperatures making it almost impossible to practice. The money raised will go toward travel and lodging expenses to practice in Augusta, Ga., in the winter months.”
The family is looking to raise $30,000 and has so far raised about $4,000.
Ryan Ballengee is a Yahoo Sports contributor. Find him on Facebook and Twitter.
